August 3, 2006 Issue                                       

©2006 The Chestnut Hill Local

Victorian charm, history in classy, safe Cape May
by LEN LEAR

The Blue Pig Tavern at Congress Hall is unquestionably one of the finest restaurants at the Jersey shore.

At Congress Hall in Cape May last week, I met a guest from New York named Tom who said that after years of saving money, he finally bought a 32-foot boat. In honor of his wife, he named it “Ruth.” On her first boat ride, Ruth, who is definitely no sailor, became violently seasick and threw up twice. She demanded to return to shore and has refused to get on the boat since then. Tom, recognizing the futility of trying to persuade her to change her mind, has renamed the boat “Ruthless.”

But that boat is about the only thing in Cape May that is ruthless. Possibly the classiest and safest (and southernmost) South Jersey resort town, Cape May is a throwback to a gentler era with its colorful Victorian homes, non-schlocky shops (try to say that five times fast), a beach with no beach fee and friendly natives.

Many of the young summer workers in Cape May these days are college kids from Eastern Europe. One young lady from Poland who had dimples riding on the crest of a smile and who was handing out samples of fudge near our hotel said, “I love this town. I go home sometimes at 3 a.m., but I feel safe. I would never go to Wildwood. I heard there were two stabbings and one shooting last week and that this was not unusual.”

Andrew Carthy is the executive chef at The Ebbitt Room, which many food critics have called the finest restaurant in all of the South Jersey shore towns.

One example of Cape May’s class is undoubtedly Congress Hall, 251 Beach Ave., which began life 190 years ago as a simple boarding house by a man named Thomas H. Hughes. In 1828 Hughes was elected to Congress, and in honor of his new status his hotel was renamed Congress Hall.

By the middle of the 19th century, Cape May had become a busy holiday destination, rivaling Saratoga and Newport in popularity. In 1878 Congress Hall was destroyed when a huge fire swept through 38 acres of Cape May’s seafront, but within a year the hotel was rebuilt, this time in brick rather than wood, and business blossomed again. The hotel and city became so popular that they became a summer retreat for the nation’s presidents. Ulysses S. Grant, Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan all stayed at Congress Hall, and Benjamin Harrison made Congress Hall his “summer White House,” even conducting affairs of state from the hotel.

The famous 19th century composer, John Philip Sousa, also loved Congress Hall. After conducting concerts on Congress Hall’s lawn with his Marine Corps band throughout the season in 1882, he composed a march in honor of the hotel, “The Congress Hall March.”

In June of 2002, a major $22 million renovation was completed on the 108-room property which removed more than 1,000 tons of decayed and outdated materials and put more than 70 tons of new steel into the old bones of the building, as well as 47 miles of new wiring and 11 miles of new plumbing.

Today Congress Hall combines the best of the old and the best of the new (fitness room, nightclub, TVs with DVD, voicemail, individual climate control, etc.). Many of its rooms have private balconies with views over the veranda and fabulous panoramas of the ocean. Rates are $115 to $405 during midweek, depending on the difference in season, room size and location, and $135 to $405 on weekends. (For more information, call 888-944-1816 or 609-884-8421 or visit www.congresshall.com.)

It was not at Congress Hall but at another hotel in Cape May where a switchboard operator was making a morning wake-up call. When she rang room number 317 at 5 a.m., she started out by saying to the sleepy occupant, “Good morning, sir.” Then glancing at her list again, she realized that she had called the wrong room and that she was supposed to call room 317 at 7 a.m. As politely as she could, the switchboard operator then said, “Sir, I just called to inform you that you have two more hours left to sleep.”

Another summertime Cape May resident, a young man at the Virginia Hotel from Russia, who spoke as if he was fastening every word down with a thumbtack, said the restaurant meals were so good in the Cape May area, he would have a hard time getting used to the not-so-flavorful-or-interesting food he’ll find when he returns home in September.

Speaking of outstanding restaurants, it’s always a bit dicey to proclaim any restaurant the “best” of any city or other large geographical area when you have not eaten at them all. (And who has?) I will say, however, that I cannot imagine any restaurant at the Jersey shore (and we have eaten at some outstanding ones like Red Square and Suilan in Atlantic City) being any better than the Ebbitt Room and Blue Pig Tavern in Cape May.

Chefs are often known to get upset when their cope runneth over, but Andrew Carthy, executive chef at The Ebbitt Room in The Virginia Hotel, 25 Jackson St., is a cocktail of coolness, concentration and charisma. His restaurant, a “Best of Philly” winner and “Best of the Best” from New Jersey Monthly, combines the polish of Philly’s best kitchens with cutting-edge ideas.

The “Tasting of crab” appetizer — flaked crab cake, blue crab soup and smoked trout salad ($15) — balanced complexity, technical prowess and pristine seafood. A cheese appetizer (you select three for $10 or five for $14) produced goat cheese, creamy Brie, cow and sheep’s milk cheese and butterscotch hard cow’s milk cheese that were simply transcendent.

Two entrees — pan-roasted salmon with fried gnocchi, pickled ramps, honshemiji mushrooms and a syrah reduction ($28); and potato-crusted halibut with pea greens, asparagus and creamed morel mushrooms ($29) — were nothing short of ambrosial. The only joker in the deck was a sorbet dessert. Two of the three sorbets, mixed berry and lemon, were bland tasting and had an icy, not smooth, texture. For more information, call 609-884-5700 or visit www.virginiahotel.com

Despite its name, the Blue Pig Tavern in Congress Hall is loaded with vanity flair. Obvious attention to detail everywhere heightens flavors, and the choreography of the waitstaff was impressive in a full Thursday night dining room with non-stop turnover.

Classic French onion soup was indulgent with a mound of heavenly Gruyère cheese ($6), and a crock of Cape May clam chowder resonated with smoky bacon flavor ($6). A Thai barbecue glazed salmon fillet had flesh as soft as down feathers and flavor as pronounced and precise as a thread moving through the eye of a needle ($19); and a sesame seared Atlantic grouper was a sublime mixture of sea and herb accents combined with wasabi aioli, stir-fried vegetables and crispy rice noodles ($19).

A chocolate dessert sampler ($10) oozed with richness and capitulated to decadence. Only the specialty coffees, not served hot, were less than perfect. For more information, call 609-884-8422 or visit congresshall.com

There are too many other fun activities in Cape May to mention here, but one can find out about them by visiting www.capemay.com.